Robots coming… don’t hold your breath.

At the weekend I watched the BBC News technology programme ‘Click’.  They excitedly (or so it seemed to me) announced the winner of the robot football ‘soccer’ competition to be the USA, followed by a  clip of the mechanical men in action.  As someone who wants to be first in the queue for a domestic robot I watched with eager interest then abject disappointment, as I realised they still had a long way to go before they could stand up without falling over.  Don’t get me wrong I know that any attempt to play football is a major achievement and they after all are trying to do in a few decades what we as humans achieved over many thousands, but I can now see my domestic robot is waving at me from a long way off.

Of course this may come as a relief to some family members and especially to my sister who occasionally comes to stay.  When I announced recently my intention to get a robot I rather got the impression she hadn’t even considered the notion.  I also told her that said Robot would have to spend it’s nights in the spare room as I didn’t want it to enquire if I needed assistance every time I got up for a glass of water.

My sister then realised the spare room ‘as i liked to call it’ was actually the one she liked to sleep in on her regular visits.  For some reason she was not at all keen on the idea of waking in the morning to see a robot leaning over her to enquire what she wanted for breakfast, I can’t imagine why.